The Heights (Al-Ma'aarej)
In the Name of Allah, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful
A supplicant asked for a punishment bound to happen 1 to those who deny the truth. No power can hinder God 2 [since it will come] from God, unto whom there are many ways of ascent: 3 (Whereby) the angels and the Spirit ascend unto Him in a Day whereof the span is fifty thousand years. 4 So be thou patient with a sweet patience; 5 Verily they think that the chastisement is far off, 6 but We see it to be very near. 7 The day the sky becomes like molten brass, 8 And the mountains will be like wool, 9 And friend shall not ask of friend 10 although they shall be within sight of one another. The guilty one would fain ransom himself from the torment of that Day by offering his children, 11 his wife, his brother, 12 his kin who sheltered him, 13 and whosoever is in the earth, all together, so that then it might deliver him. 14 No! Indeed, it is the Flame [of Hell], 15 Plucking out (his being) right to the skull!- 16 It calleth him who turned and fled (from truth), 17 and amassed wealth and hoarded it. 18 ۞ Human beings are created greedy. 19 when misfortune touches him he starts lamenting, 20 And niggardly when good reaches him;- 21 Except the observers of prayer - 22 Those who are constant in their prayer 23 They are those who assign a certain share of their property 24 For him who begs and for him who is denied (good) 25 And those who believe in the Day of Judgement, 26 And those who are fearful of their Lord's doom - 27 Surely the chastisement of their Lord is (a thing) not to be felt secure of-- 28 And those who preserve their chastity 29 except from their wives and slave girls, in which case they are not to be blamed, 30 But those who seek more than this will be transgressors; 31 And those who keep their trusts and covenants; 32 and standby their witnessing, 33 and (finally) those who do not miss their ritual - prayers at the prescribed times; 34 Such shall dwell in the Gardens (i.e. Paradise) honoured. 35